Stocks rise as June jobs report beats expectations

Stocks rose sharply Thursday after the June jobs report surpassed expectations and boosted Wall Street’s confidence in the U.S. economic recovery from the coronavirus recession despite rising COVID-19 cases.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose more than 450 points Thursday morning, climbing about 1.7 percent after the Labor Department reported a June gain of 4.8 million jobs. The S&P 500 index rose 1.5 percent and the NASDAQ composite rose roughly 1.4 percent.

The June jobs report exceeded the predictions of economists, who largely projected a gain of 1 million to 3 million jobs last month. The unemployment rate also dropped to 11.1 percent in June after peaking at 14.7 percent in April and falling to 13.3 percent in May.

June’s job gains marked the largest one-month rise in employment in modern U.S. history, a distinction touted by President Trump and top administration officials during a press conference Thursday.

“Our economy is roaring back,” Trump declared.

Even so, two months of steady job gains have still left 17.8 million Americans unemployed as a surge of coronavirus cases across the South and Sun Belt force governors to reimpose pandemic-related restrictions that could dampen the recovery.

The number of U.S. workers who permanently lost their jobs also climbed in June by 588,000 to a total of 2.8 million. The number of workers who’ve been jobless for at least 15 weeks also rose by 825,000, and those who have been unemployed for more than 27 weeks rose by 227,000.

“We’re going to be concerned until every single person is back to work,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said during the press conference Thursday.